Last updated 15:43, Wednesday, 03 December 2008

Two cancer scares in as many years have left 28-year-old Rachel Medich in no doubt at all that life is simply too short not to make the most of every day.

• Slideshow: Rachel Medich

Rachel Medich

So, she’s decided to take a shot at being a model.

Not that Rachel is the kind to have too much time on her hands. She’s already a busy girl – breathlessly so.

When she’s not at work in a Cumberland Infirmary operating theatre, studying for exams or sweating over assignments for her University of Cumbria course, she’s a rally co-driver and a volunteer with the Rally Rescue Ambulance service – first on the scene with vital medical care when drivers dangerously come a cropper.

She loves shopping, dressing up and going out with friends and when cash is tight and she feels her wardrobe needs a bit of an overhaul, she revamps and recycles her old clothes herself, to give them a revitalising update.

“I do all kinds of things. I take the view you should make the most of the time you’ve got,” she said.

“I’m always on the go, usually behind deadline with my uni assignments and right now exams are looming – but when I saw Me was calling for models, I thought I’d like to have a go. Life is much too short not to try new things, even if just for a laugh!”

Rachel, who lives in Willow Place, Parkland Drive, Carlisle, is a student operating department practitioner, which means that most working days at the Cumberland Infirmary she’s in less than glamorous scrubs in an operating theatre, without a scrap of makeup and wearing what she describes as “a silly hat.”

When she qualifies in 2010 the silly hat will become a fixture. She will specialise in theatre anaesthetics and recovery in a key critical care role. It’s a career she looks forward to with excited enthusiasm.

“It’s a passion for me,” she said. “Precisely what I want to be doing – although working in theatre has tended to make me a bad patient.”

A couple of years ago Rachel had a salivary gland removed as a result of a worrying cancer scare. In July of this year she had to undergo a second lymph node biopsy because of suspected lymphoma.

“The surgery has left a scar on my neck and it’s not something I’d want to repeat in a hurry,” she said. “We hospital people are notoriously poor patients. I’m hoping everything will be OK now. With any luck I’ll only need to go into theatre to work.”

Life has rarely been dull for Rachel, who says she is “very single but keeping options open.”

She worked for a time as clinical support in the accident and emergency department in Lancaster and before that, following a course in equine science at Myerscough College, Preston, groomed horses for professional show jumpers and trainers.

“I drifted for a while into holistic therapies and after studying anatomy for that, I found I had a real flair. Care – particularly critical care – just clicked as absolutely what I wanted to do.

“I enjoy being out in the thick of it and am practically fearless... although when I volunteer on the Rally Rescue Ambulance, which means I get to see the bad accidents from time to time, that chips away at my bravery.

“Why do I want to be a model? I suppose because I love dressing up and messing around with makeup. I think getting ready for a night out is very often the best part of the whole evening.

“And I’ve learned over the last couple of years that if there’s something you really want to do, you should go ahead and do it – life’s too precious not to use every minute.”

Rachel will be one of our fashion models in a future edition of Me.